


To Feel Complete

by BeeTrixR



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Curse, Alternate Universe - No Magic, F/F, OC - Based on Roland Hood
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-03-10
Updated: 2018-06-13
Packaged: 2018-10-01 08:27:23
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 15,958
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10185086
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BeeTrixR/pseuds/BeeTrixR
Summary: Emma is proud of where she is in her life. She has the most beautiful 10 year old son, she got her life around and she feels almost happy. Almost. Maybe the knock on her door on her 28th birthday can help her finally fill the void left in her heart and she may feel complete.Meanwhile, Regina is a woman with a dark secret, a dark past and an even darker ancestry. Her life is wrapped up in so much misery that not even she knows all of it. The only light in her life is her beautiful son, whom she loves more than she ever thought herself capable of. But a storm is coming her way and this can all end with her life on the spotlight for all to see, or her life can finally begin and her only wish finally become real: to feel complete.





	1. The Journey Starts Here

**Author's Note:**

> You know the drill, y'guys: None of this belongs to me, unfortunately. It is an AU fanfic based on OUAT.  
> I don't usually write fanfiction and I don't have a beta. So sue me! No, really... just tell me if something is wrong.
> 
> Warnings in the notes of the chapters just so the spoiler is not too much.

Emma got home almost 10pm. Sat down with a cupcake and a candle and made a wish. I wish that someday I feel complete. And then, strong knocks on her door. She got up and looked through the peephole, sighed and opened the door:  
“Roland, what the hell are you doing outside at this time?”  
The 10 year old boy looked at her confused and said:  
”Are you Emma Swan?”  
Emma laughed and ushered him inside.  
“Come on, kid. You can finish this surprise for my birthday inside. Is late.”  
The boy looked at her funny again, as if trying to convey if she was crazy.  
Then Emma heard a noise behind her and turned to see her son, Roland, with wide eyes looking to an exact copy of himself who was by the door.  
The not-Roland smiled and said:  
“Cool, I'm a twin! My name is Henry, by the way. I'm your son.”  
Emma couldn't wrap her mind around it, her mind immediately went back to when the doctor informed her that her son had died. She couldn’t understand, both boys were fine just moments ago. How could one of them had died? What was she gonna do with all the matching onesies she bought? Her oldest son was dead. She couldn’t accept it. She was his mother, she would’ve felt if something had happened, wouldn’t she? Her mind brought her back to the present and when she opened her mouth, she said:  
“It's not possible. You're dead. I mourned you. We always buy a cupcake for you on Roland's birthday. You were stillbirth. I never even got to see you! I only got to name you for your death certificate. Ray Swan, my oldest. Her hand shot to his face, but she got afraid of touch him and he turn up to not be real.”  
Henry looked at her sadly and took her hand and put above his heart.  
“I... Don't know. All I know is that my mom is The Evil Queen and you need to stop her. She probably stole me instead of adopting me. Maybe that’s what happened. And you're the saviour, you're going to defeat her. I’m here and you’re my real mom.”  
Roland walked really slowly and stopped in front of Henry.   
“I dreamt about you. I still do sometimes. I thought you were trying to talk to me from heaven. To see if we were ok. But you are alive.”  
Henry answered:  
“I dream about you sometimes too. I thought it was a revelation of how my life was supposed to be if Emma raised me instead of my mom.”  
“Ma.”  
“What?”  
“We call Emma, ma. And the lady that stole you, what's her name?”  
“Regina.”  
While the boys were talking, Emma's mind was running. Her oldest son, for 4 minutes, was alive and someone had taken him from her. She was going to get to the bottom of this and get her family together.  
“Henry, Roland, you guys stay at the apartment, I'm gonna be out for a moment. Henry I'm gonna need your... Mom's.. contact number.”  
How it hurt to say that, Emma thought. Her baby boy, all grown up and she didn't raise him. And the woman was a bitch. He called her the Evil Queen for Christ sake. She was going to solve this and get him back.  
Emma left the apartment and went to her office. Ran down background checks on Regina Mills, the whole shebang. His medical papers indicated that he had a very serious heart condition. Emma’s eyes filled with tears, that’s what the doctor had said to her when they gave her the death certification. Hearts Malfunction, common in twins, one develops better than the other and other things. She shook her head and came back to the present. Her son was alive.  
She got the dossier with all this info and got back to her apartment. She didn’t got much on the woman, though, which was weird in and on itself. She didn’t even had a facebook page.  
By the time she got home, it was pass 3am and her boys were sleeping on Roland’s bed. Roland was with a hand on Ray’s - Henry, she said to herself - chest, like feeling his heartbeat as if trying to convince himself his brother was very much alive. She decided to leave them to sleep and first thing in the morning, they would do a trip to wherever it was that Henry had came from.  
Roland got up before the sun rose and he was alone in his bed. He went into his mother's bedroom and she was sleeping alone. He woked her up:  
“Ma, ma! Henry is gone!”  
“What?”  
“Henry is gone, ma!”  
Emma shot up and out of bed and ran to the door. When she got in the kitchen, Henry was making coffee. Emma sighed in relief.  
“He’s here at the kitchen, Rolo.”  
“Oh, sorry, ma. I just woke up and he wasn’t there. I thought someone had taken him away again.”  
Henry looked at him like he was silly.  
“I’m making coffee, bro! I was gonna wake you guys up for breakfast.”  
Emma looked at him with curiosity.  
“You know how to cook breakfast? Doesn’t your… mom cook it for you?” Emma fished for information on her son’s life.  
“She does, but on holidays like on Mother’s day or Valentine’s day I usually make her breakfast. I learnt the basics on the internet.”  
Emma looked at him like he wasn’t making much sense and he sighed.  
“What?”  
“You make your mother breakfast on valentine’s day? Isn’t that your dad’s job or something?”  
“Well, it’s just me and mom. She never dated anybody, but I know she was married before.”  
“Oh. I get it.”  
“Anyway, Emma, you and Roland have to get me home. Mom does not know where I am and I’m gone for almost two days now. She’s gonna put an Amber alert on me or something.”  
Emma almost beat herself. How could she have been so careless? Of course she had to make this woman know Henry was safe, even if she may not care, it was her job to do so.  
“Call her, Henry. If I go to jail, Roland does not have nobody to take care of him.”  
“Fine. But I’ll only call when we are on the road. OK?”  
“Ok, Henry. Let’s go, Rolo. Grab a backpack. It’s mission time. Where are we going, Henry?”  
“Oh, Maine. Storybrooke, Maine, actually.”  
Emma was already tired. This was going to be a six hour drive and she was not at all happy with this, but Henry’s presence in her life was way more than enough to make up for it.  
Henry had a book that seemed like very important for him. When Emma and Rolo asked what that was about, he said they were not ready for it yet. So they drove in silence. Every mile closer to Storybrooke shifting the mood in the car for worse.  
Emma’s mind was running thousands of miles per second. First things first. She was going to a hotel find a room for her and Roland and maybe Henry. Then, she was going to take Henry to his supposed Evil mother. She looked at her son. She saw no signs of abuse on him. He was open, trusting, his clothes were all designer, his cellphone was the latest model. Maybe his life was not so bad. That would be great, if at least he had a good life. But if his life is good, why would him call his mother the evil queen? Better question yet: how in the hell had he end up with a widow on some Shithole town in effin Maine? Why would someone tell her her son was dead and take him away from her? She didn’t realized she was crying until her vision became blurry.  
The car crossed the town line and they saw the sign saying Welcome to Storybrooke.  
Henry said, then:  
“The journey of the brave hero starts here.”  
Emma rolled her eyes. If the kid only knew.  
Emma ran her car into town and stopped when she saw a sign: Granny’s Bed and Breakfast. When she got out and asked for a room, the old lady looked at her funny and gave her the keys. She made Roland go to their room and wait while she went to Henry’s house. The boy was not happy about it, but she promised to keep him on the loop when she got back and that they would see Henry soon and he backed off. Then she got in the car and drove to Henry’s house.  
When they got there, Henry looked at her and said:  
“Don’t make me go. I don’t want to live with her. I rather stay with you and Roland.”  
Emma sighed and shaked her head:  
“Sorry, Henry. Did you called her?”  
“I texted her.”  
“Ok, so let’s do this.”  
Henry got out of the car and make a move to go to the house. At the same moment, his mother left the house running to him.  
“Henry? Henry! Are you ok? Where have you been? What happened?”  
Regina tried to hug him and he dismissed her. Emma could see the hurt in her eyes turn into fear, disbelief and hate when he said:  
“I found my real mom!”  
Regina’s icy stare made her gulp, Emma could see the Evil Queen persona right there.  
“You’re Henry’s birth mother?”  
“Hi.”


	2. You Did This

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Emma thinks Regina is responsible and hates her for it.  
> Regina can't understand how Emma could have been so shallow and hates her for it. She did this, after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: Minor flashback setting. Minor reference to abusive past.

Sheriff Graham shows up behind Regina and says:  
“I’m just gonna check up on the lad, see if he’s alright.”  
Is exactly the thing Regina needed to bring her back from the shock.  
-”How would you like a glass of the best apple cider you ever tasted?”  
“Got anything stronger?”  
Regina couldn’t believe this. Henry had run away from home to bring the very woman who had abandoned him at the door of a orphanage, had gave him up just because he was sick as if he was something less than perfect. How dare she? Henry was the most precious thing in the world, the best thing to ever happen to her. Her perfect little baby boy. And now she just has the arrogance of show up and what? If she thinks she’ll have a place in Henry’s life after 10 years, she is mistaken. Oh, so very mistaken. Regina will make Henry see just how much of a failure his birth mother was, if is the last thing she does. She takes a deep breath, turns around and walks back inside her house, without checking if this woman is going to follow.  
Once inside the house, Regina directs the woman to her study, pours a glass of cider for herself and whiskey for the woman and decides to grab the bull by the horns already.  
“I’m sorry Henry disrupted your life, Miss…”  
“Swan. Emma Swan.”  
“Very well, Miss Swan. I’m Regina Mills, Henry’s mother.”  
“Look, lady…”  
“No, Miss Swan. You look. While you were doing whatever the hell it was you were doing for the last 10 years, I was the one who raised Henry. Sooted every fever, tolerated every tantrum, changed every diaper, cleaned all his messes, paid all the costs, bought and wrapped every birthday and christmas present. Henry is my son! And if you think you can show up 10 years late and take him from me, you are sorely mistaken.”  
“Your son? You did this! Stole my son from me, made me mourn him for the last 10 years, took away the only thing I ever did right on my life! But you already knew that, didn’t you? I’m gonna make sure you rot in jail, lady!”  
“Are you insane? If someone is going to jail, is you! Abandonment of incapable. I adopted Henry after YOU abandoned a 4 month old baby outside an orphanage, for what? Just because he was sick and probably couldn’t fit your expectation from the perfect poster child? And now you want him? He’s not yours. You did this, now live with it!”  
“Wait, what?”  
“Exactly, Miss Swan! Henry could have been too much cost and little reward for you because of his illness, but I adopt him 9 and a half years ago, brought him home and made sure he was always taken care of, never missed his meds and never strayed from his diet in order to keep him alive and well, because for me he’s more than enough. He’s perfect.”  
“Wait… You’re telling me you adopted him legally after he was dumped outside an orphanage? Seriously?”  
“Yes, I am. But you already know this. You left him there to die!”  
Regina was fast losing her patience. Who this woman thought she was? She would press charges very soon. When she turned around to go to Henry’s room, Graham came inside the study.  
“Outside of being a very tired little boy, he’s just fine.”  
Regina’s shoulders relaxed immensely. Before she could ask, Graham continued.  
“He already had his meds and his healthy shake. He’s fine. He told me that he didn’t had any of it yesterday, though and I don’t know what to do about it. Thought I should ask you.”  
Regina turned to look at Emma’s face with the utmost disgust and rage.  
“You left him without his meds for a whole day? And what did he eat, for the love of God?”  
Emma ran her hand through her hair and sighed. She never thought about Henry’s health during their meals. Roland always eaten anything and everything. But she was not sure if she should mention Roland for this woman yet.  
“We had chocolate cake last night, it was my birthday. Pancakes this morning. Burgers for lunch and now we’re here.”  
“Oh, my God! Are you trying to kill my son?”  
Regina turned to Graham.  
“We can’t do much about it. Just resume to his diet and meds and keep an eye on him in case this whole adventure of him ends up causing him harm. I’m going to call Dr. Hopper and Dr. McGenn tomorrow first thing in the morning. Thank you, sheriff.”  
“Is ok, Reg… Madam Mayor. I call you, tomorrow?”  
“We will talk about it after I solve the problems with my son, sheriff. He’s my priority.”  
“I know. Have a good night, Madam Mayor.”  
He looked from Regina to Emma.  
“Good night, Miss.”  
Regina cut Emma’s response.  
“Good night, sheriff. Close the door as you leave, please.”  
Graham left. Emma looked awed to Regina.  
“You’re the mayor?”  
Regina laughed a throaty laugh and turned to look at Emma.  
“Yes, Miss Swan. I am. This is my town and I would highly appreciate if you vacant it.”  
Emma looked at her you fire and fight in her eyes.  
“If you think you’re going to scare me to leave, you are very much mistaken. I don’t know how dangerous you think you are, but you have no idea what I’m capable of.”  
“Oh, Miss Swan. I am not scaring you to leave. I am asking politely for you to. You already brought my son back. You don’t need to stay.”  
“I want to meet Henry. Get to know him. And I want to know how the hell you end up with him.”  
Regina’s glare could kill someone a little less feisty than Emma Swan. But Emma herself didn’t even blinked at Regina’s tone. She just noticed how close they were and backed away a step.  
Regina walked behind her desk, removed the frame of what looked like a very expansive painting on the wall, opened her safe and took a brown envelope.  
“Here, Miss Swan. Take your time. I am going to check on my son.”  
While Regina left to check on Henry, Emma looked through the files. All of it was official and very much in order. Henry didn’t just showed up on Regina’s life. She went through the entire system. She got his medical record. His first appointment had been right after he was 4 month old. He was left abandoned on the door of an orphanage on the dead of night and was almost dead himself by the time they found him in the morning. He was admitted at the Boston General. A week later he got out, was put in the system and soon Regina was called to meet him. Even though they explained to her how critical his condition was, she decided to keep him. She had the means to it. She fostered him for a little more than a month and adopted him when he was six month old. She named him Henry Mills.  
Emma looked through all the papers one more time. Then she decided to show Regina her papers. The entire dossier she had organized on her and Henry’s papers from the hospital, including his death certificate. She went to the Bug to grab the folder.  
Regina entered the study ready for the confrontation and to make this woman leave her life for good but how was she surprised when she found herself very much alone. She went to her desk to see if the woman had taken Henry’s documents with her, while mentally berating herself for leaving the woman alone. While she was checking if any of her files was missing, she heard the front door close and turned to the door. Emma Swan was in front of her in seconds and she sighed.  
“Life is not that good, of course. I thought you had left, Miss Swan. After I had proved to you that Henry is very much my son and you have no claim to him, whatsoever.”  
“Actually, Madam Mayor, I went to my car to bring you my documents about my baby boy and prove to you that if it was up to me, you’d never have Henry.”  
Regina turned to her in fury but Emma placated her.  
“I meant that I’d never give him up. I don’t exactly know what happen. But I’m gonna hope that you’ll help me figure it out.”  
She put the files on the desk and decided to start telling the woman the story of the day she had played time and again on her mind trying to figure out how everything had gotten so out of hand.  
“I got to the medical aisle having strong contractions very early in the morning. I had just entered the 8th month, but the doctors said it was normal twins come early.”  
Regina looked at Emma with wide eyes and blurted:  
“Henry is a twin? Where is him? Is he ok?”  
Emma smiled a little at the thought of this woman being concerned about Roland without even knowing him just because of his connection to Henry. Regina furrowed her brows in concern for this boy that could be very much dead if his heart condition was as much problematic as Henry’s. She motioned to Emma to sit down, and sat herself behind her desk.  
“Yes, Rolo is ok.”  
Before Regina could open her mouth, Emma raised her hand to stop her.  
“Please, let me just tell you and then you can ask around all you want.”  
Regina relented with a nod.  
“Anyway, it was the longest 18 hours of my life, but when the first born cried, I was so happy. Four minutes later, the second one got out and I remember I thought: this is something I did right. Something I can be proud of. While I decided the names, Ray and Roland, something went wrong. I couldn’t do anything while the doctors took both babies away and I panicked so much that the nurse put me down with a tranquilizer. When I woke up, the doctor said my babies had a defective heart syndrome and only the youngest had survived.”  
Emma was crying and she wouldn’t even notice if a tear hadn’t fallen on the document she took out of the folder. She wiped the tear and extended the document to Regina.  
“Here. It’s Ray’s death certificate. Ray is how I named Henry. You can look at all the files and documents. I didn’t abandon him. I thought he was dead until he showed up at my place looking exactly like his brother.”  
Regina decided she was done keeping quiet, her mind was in turmoil.  
“So, you kept Roland? And he’s ok? But what about his heart? You eat cakes and pizzas and you never questioned about Henry’s condition! You’re gonna get him killed! You never saw Ray’s body? How did they got him out of the hospital? And why steal a baby just to abandon him to die?”  
Emma had thought about all of this already and decided to be honest with the woman.  
“Yes, I kept Roland. He’s at the Bed n’ Breakfast, probably sleeping by now. I have him tested every year, but apparently his heart is just fine. He never had any conditions, but as I didn’t have a way to investigate Ray’s death, being a single mother at 18 and all, I just assumed he was the only one with an actual problem and the doctor was just trying to tell me it was a possibility that Roland developed it also. Sincerely thought, this part of his speech got a little lost to me after he said Ray was dead. Anyway, He’s healthy as a horse. And no, I never saw Ray’s body. They kept Roland in the NICU for two weeks after the birth so he could be monitored and grew stronger and I never left his side. I never asked to see the body, either. I was heartbroken. I didn’t want to see him, because seeing him would make it real. And about how they did what they did and why, I have no idea but I’ll find out and I’ll be damned if I don’t.”  
Regina was trying very hard to stay mad at this woman, but she could understand the pain of losing a child. But she’d rather die than to leave this woman with the impression that she could take Henry from her.  
“I see. Either way, as things are now I am the solely guardian and mother Henry has. When I adopted him, I was under the impression his birth parents wouldn’t want any contact with him because he was abandoned and I’d very much like it stayed that way. I will help you on your search for the responsibles for stealing him as a baby, but right now, I advise you to go back to your own son and life because I am Henry’s mother. Always have been and always will be.”  
Emma was seething with hate. How dare this woman say she can’t be around her own son?  
“Oh, now I know your husband left you. You’re an egocentric, anal retentive, cold bitch and…”  
Emma didn’t see it coming. This composed woman who could have been a queen on her past life by the way she carried herself hit her with a very real, full open hand in the cheek, slap.  
Regina lost it. She got to her feet in a jump that sent her office chair right to the wall and started pacing, looking very much like she was trying to prevent herself from murdering the woman before her in cold blood.  
“YOU DON’T HAVE ANY IDEA OF WHAT YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT! HOW DARE YOU MENTION THAT INSIDE MY HOUSE? YOU DON’T KNOW WHO I AM, WHAT I HAVE DONE AND WHAT I CAN DO TO YOU. I AM GONNA END YOU IF I MUST BUT YOU WILL NOT TAKE AWAY THE ONLY GOOD THING IN MY LIFE, YOU WILL NOT HAVE HENRY! YOU ARE NOT GONNA TAKE MY CHILD FROM ME!”  
Regina curved in herself protectively, arms around her belly as if protecting a baby. Emma realized that she had made a huge mistake. She walked behind Regina and reached at her elbow to make her look at her. Regina flinched and tried to step away from Emma.  
“DO NOT TOUCH ME!”  
Emma got an even stronger hold of Regina’s elbow, her nails making half moons on Regina’s flesh. She saw something change immediately. Regina shrinked in sight, her whole body started trembling, her head bowed and her eyes glued to the ground. When she opened her mouth to talk, her voice was barely above a whisper.  
“Please, don’t hurt me. Please.”  
Emma dropped her hand as if Regina’s skin was a hot potato and she looked at the woman in horror. She knew those signs, she had lived through it. The signs of a flashback on an abused person. She saw Regina coming back to present and her posture changing back, completely stiff.  
Emma blurted out, before she could think.  
“What made you this way?”  
Regina closed her eyes, counted to 10 and back, put her emotions in check as much as she could and opened her eyes.  
“Please, leave, Miss Swan. And stay away from MY SON.”  
Regina turned her back to Emma and held her breath, waiting for the woman to leave. She berated herself in her lack of control. She didn’t have flashbacks like that in years. Since 6 month in her treatment with Dr. Hopper. She was not going to start regressing in her path because of Henry’s birth mother. This woman was a even bigger problem than she first accessed. She had to leave.


	3. I'm His Mother

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the wait. Grad school really breaking my legs. But it is my own fault. I could stay undergrad forever. Just kidding.  
> I'll try make this more presentable and post more frequently... My sister is already calling twice a week to know if I finished the story.  
> Sorry, sorella! Promise to try and be better. Luv u!

Emma sat in her bed at the bed n’ breakfast. Regina Mills was an even bigger mystery than she thought. She opened the file she had on the woman.  
Single, 37 years old, filthy rich, daughter of ex-congresswoman Cora Mills and deceased CEO of Mills Corp, Henry Mills.  
No more info on the woman publicly life displayed. She doesn’t make use of social media, her name completely out of greed on the web.  
Emma got her computer and searched deep. When she was about to give up, she found a site that showed a picture of a 25 year old Regina Mills Blanchard, on the congress. The site had lots of theories about why the Oh, so powerful Mills Second had disappeared after her giving up her place as US Representative half through her term. Stories about how she was the secret and silent hand of an invisible master that was playing the entire congress for their own benefit, and how after their wishes were granted she vanished. A huge alarm set off on her head. How it was that an ex-congresswoman had nothing on her online? Why? She remembered Regina saying “you don’t know who I am, what I have done”. Maybe Henry wasn’t so wrong after all and maybe if she could prove this woman was up to something or that she was unfit to be a parent, she could take Henry and Roland and go back to Boston. She decided she was going to start in the morning.  
Emma and Roland went down to Granny’s diner for breakfast. When they got there, the waitress, Ruby, started talking to Roland as if he was Henry.  
“Morning, Henry. And who’s the lady? Regina is not going to be pleased if you are talking with strangers, little one! You know how protective she is. 6 years and she’s still suspicious of me around you.”  
Ruby didn’t realise Regina and Henry had entered the diner while she talked:  
“That is because you almost poisoned Henry with nuts, Miss Lucas.”  
Regina then looked at Roland and smiled a rare Henry only smile at him while everyone else at the diner looked between Roland and Henry trying to understand.  
“Hello, dear. Roland, I presume. You are a very beautiful boy. You are a little thicker than Henry, but I suppose that you two have a very different diet. You are taller than him, though, also probably because of the differences between you two. You seem a very charming boy. Is a pleasure to meet you.”  
Roland looked at her in suspicion and said:  
“You’re the lady who took Ray away from us. He is going to go back with us now that he found us, though. He doesn’t need you any longer. He has his family now.”  
Regina seemed ready to blow an artery but she refused to yell at the boy. She acknowledged Emma for the first time and gave a death glare towards her, then looked back at Roland.  
“I really don’t know how to say this in a easy way, Roland, but I am Henry’s family. No matter what your mother has been telling you, I adopted Henry, not stole him. I waited for a baby on the adoption system for 2 years before they called me about Henry. And I am sure that your mother and I can work a way that you can be in Henry’s life and he can be in yours. Perhaps you could spend a day together every once in awhile, I am not sure how it would play out, but Henry is mine and stays with me at least until he reaches majority. I hope you understand.”  
“Henry said you are mean, evil. Ma will not let him stay with you!”  
A flash of hurt goes passes her face but she recovers fast, turns to Henry and question:  
“Why would you say that to strangers, Henry? You know that this gives people the chance to make assumptions, honey...”  
“You are the Evil Queen, it is in the book! You cursed all the people in this town so they don’t remember! You make me go to Archie so everyone will think I’m crazy just for them don’t figure out the truth! You don’t love me, you can’t love anyone, just yourself. Your tried to kill Snow White because she was prettier than you.”  
Emma looked at Henry as if he was crazy, as did almost everyone else in the diner. Regina just shaked her head sadly.  
“Henry, dear, I didn’t sent you to Dr. Hopper to make you think you are crazy. I have appointments with him weekly as well. I sent you there so you could talk to him and maybe be less angry. You have been angry with me since that insipid Mary Margaret told you you were adopted, as if I can’t love you because you are not biologically mine which could not be further from the truth. You are mine regardless of biology, I have loved you since I first saw you, my little prince.”  
Henry didn’t seem convinced and Roland was supporting him. Meanwhile Emma still was not grasping what was happening and Regina was so focused on making the boys understand that she forgot she was in a very public diner and at least half the town was seeing this.  
“No, that’s not true! I read the book Miss Blanchard gave me. She is Snow White, you are the Evil Queen, I heard her saying to Mr Nolan that someday you will pay for everything that you did to her.”  
Regina lost her patience right then. She did not raised her voice, instead her voice lowered and reverberated through Henry, Roland, Emma and Ruby that were the closest to her.  
“Henry Mills you will listen right now and I won’t repeat myself. First, eavesdropping is wrong and I raised you to be polite, you should not be listening to what Miss Blanchard say in private. Second, my history with Mary Margaret Blanchard is none of your concern and you should not take her word for mine in anything. In fact she should just move on with her life and stop obsessing over mine. And third, you will not keep making scenes in front of half the town just because you are unhappy with me. We will solve our problems at home. Never in public. Our personal life is not for public consumption, do you understand me?”  
“Yeah.”  
“Great. Now you will say your goodbyes to Miss Swan and Roland and go to school. Maybe you can spend some time with Roland at the afternoon. Have a good day, dear.”  
Henry did not answered her, just turned to Roland and Emma. Regina asked Ruby for a coffee to go and waited for Henry to finish his goodbyes and walk to school. She then turned to Miss Swan.  
“I hope you are already planning your leave.”  
“What it is with Henry and the fairy tales? And what about being mad for being adopted?”  
“Not that is any of you business, but Miss Blanchard and I do not have a good relationship and she decided that a way to make my life miserable was through my son. As he seems to think that because she is nice and appears to be a saint and all that she says is gold, it was the perfect plan. She told him he was adopted, that I was not his ‘real mother’ and then ‘tried to make amends’ by giving him the book he now carries around like it is the bible. The book tells a slightly different version of Snow White, for what I gathered. Dr. Hopper thinks that using the book gives him the justification he needs to hate me, since he feels betrayed that I never told him about the adoption.”  
Roland was trying to understand what was happening. His brother didn’t tell him that he thought his adoptive mother was evil because of a fairytale book and if she didn’t stole him, but really adopted him, so somebody else did and things were really becoming complicated. He decided it was time to ask some questions.  
“So, lady, if you didn’t stole Henry, who did? And why? And why can’t he live with me and ma? And why this other lady hates you? And why Henry believes this fairytales so badly?”  
Regina looked at Roland and smiled, recognizing much of Henry’s curiosity streak on his brother.  
“Well, Roland, I think if we are having this conversation, perhaps, we should find a booth.”  
She guided a very confused Emma Swan and an even more suspicious Roland to an empty booth and started talking.  
“See, dear, I always protected Henry very much, because unlike you, Roland, he does not have a good health. His heart does not work properly, since birth, I was told. So I always keep him close and avoid things that can be bad for his condition, such as fast food, playing outside and other things like that, you understand?”  
She waited for him and Emma to nod before resuming her talk.  
“Because he could not play outside, or run, or do other similar activities, Henry never had a big group of friends and reading became a way for him to fight loneliness. I always invite some of his colleagues to our house to movie nights and such, and Henry goes to sleepovers but he cannot participate of activities like Hide and Seek, for example. I believe that his passion for books in general, plus the message for hope that fairy tales evoke are what makes him grip so tightly at that book.”  
Emma cut in:  
“And what about the lady that gave him the book?”  
“Miss Blanchard?”  
Emma nodded and Regina sighed, running her hand through her hair.  
“I really don’t have much to say, we don’t get along. We met a long time ago, in NYC. She never understood me and always made a lot of assumptions about my person, we were friends for a short period and when this relationship ended, we started disliking each other very much. I don’t like her because she remembers me of things that I rather forget all the time. Things I came to Storybrooke to leave behind, but somehow she ended up here, as well.”  
“Oh.”  
“Exactly. Oh. Now, Roland, about who took Henry from your mother, I don’t know but your mother and I will be working on trying to figure it out. But both of you should go back to Boston, since you already lost two days of school and I believe your mother has to go back to work.”  
Roland and Emma furrowed their eyebrows in twin movements and Roland questioned:  
“What about Henry, though? Why can’t he come with us? Ma is his mother too.”  
Regina was getting tired of this same question being thrown all the time.  
“Well, as this may be truth, I am his legal guardian and adoptive mother, which means he stays with me and I will not move to Boston. And even though I don’t want to prevent your contact with your brother, Roland, I have the same intentions of sharing my position of Henry’s parent with your mother as she has of sharing you with me, which is none.”  
“But ma is his real mother.”  
Emma could see Regina losing her patience, her vein in her neck pulsing and she swallowing multiple times, her eyes closed. Regina opened her eyes and looked at her as if telling her to answer her son, but Emma didn’t have it in her to disagree and correct him. She was his real mother, she didn’t give him up willingly.  
Fury welled up in Regina when she saw Emma look away. She looked at Roland and her eyes softened when she saw her son’s face looking back at her.  
“Well, Roland, blood does not make a family. Love does. I love Henry and have loved him since the first time I picked him up at the orphanage and took him home, when he was just a baby. I am his mother. Even if I had given birth to him, I wouldn’t love him any more or any less than I already do.”  
Emma felt ashamed of herself, so she turned to her son:  
“Rolo, as much as I love Henry and want him to be with us, Regina is the only mother he has known his whole life. She took care of him and loved him, his whole life. We can’t just take him away.”  
“But ma, he said he wants to live with us!”  
“He what?” Regina hissed.  
“I mean...” Roland couldn’t bring himself to finish.  
“Henry is not going anywhere, Roland. That’s final.” Regina said and turned to Emma. “Go back to Boston, Miss Swan, before your presence create anymore damage.”  
“I didn’t do any damage, you did that all on your own.” Emma saw red. “If Henry does not want you, that’s not my problem. Maybe he’s better off without, anyway.”  
“Miss Swan, I assure you, you will regret you attitude if you don’t tone it down right now. My son is way better with me than he could ever be with you, of that I am sure. Henry does not need you. Leave us be.” Regina got up and left, two angry Swans watching her.  
“We’ll not leave Henry behind, right, ma?”  
“I think we have to look for a more permanent place for us here, Roland. We can’t leave him behind, but we can’t take him away without me being charged with kidnaping. So, we are going to move to Storybrooke, at least for the time being.” Emma said while looking defeated. She hated small towns. “I’m going to go to the school, see if I can find a way to transfer you right away, ok? Stay at our room until I come back.”  
Emma charged up to Storybrooke High. Walking through the corridors until she bumped into a small brunette.  
“I’m so sorry.” the brunette woman said.  
“Nah, it’s ok. I should’ve been looking where I was going. Do you know where do I find the principal’s office or something?” Emma said.  
“Well, I do. I teach the fourth grade. You’re new in town, right?”  
“Yeah, Emma Swan, pleasure to meet you.”  
“Oh, Henry’s birth mother. He talked a lot about you and his twin today. I’m Mary Margareth, his teacher.”  
“Ah, did he? Well, I am actually looking for information in how to transfer Roland here.” Emma said. “We want to be a part of his life and he can’t leave without Regina and for her to leave is harder than for us to come here, so...” she rambled to the woman she barely new.  
“Well, I’m surprised Regina will let you be a part of his life. She is… how can I say?” Mary Margareth stalled. “Well, she’s dangerous and poisonous, but don’t tell anyone I said that, though everybody knows we don’t see eye to eye.” She stage whispered. “Just look out for yourself.”  
Emma’s eyebrows shot to her hairline. “Why’d you say she’s dangerous? She did something to Henry?” She got worked up.  
“No, nothing like that. I know her since before Henry, though. Before Storybrooke. Someday soon you will know what I am talking about.” She said cryptically. “Anyway, since you are going to move here, maybe you would be interested in share an apartment with me. Here’s my card. It has enough place for you and your son.”  
“Right, thanks.” Emma eyed the woman suspiciously, she was overly joyous and simpatic but at the same time seemed bitter when she talked about Regina. After the strange conversation, she guided Emma where she needed to go and went back to class.  
Regina walked to Dr. Hopper’s office to her weekly appointment.  
“Good morning, Regina.”  
“Only for you, Dr. Hopper. What I am having is the furthest thing from a good day I assure you.”  
“Ok, maybe we could start talking about what is having such a drastic effect on your day and then move to that frantic message you left yesterday on my voicemail, shaw we?”  
“Fine. As you probably know, Henry ran away from home and came back with his birth mother and his twin. Apparently, she didn’t abandon him, as we thought. Someone falsified his death, as a stillbirth, but somewhere along the way gave him up. But now this woman is here and I don’t know if the fact that she thought he was dead means she can win him over in court and take him from me, but she and everybody else is questioning or will question my right to Henry. I can’t lose him.” Regina paced the office in front of his chair. “And his fairy tale obsession is not helping, either. He keeps going through town telling everybody how I am evil, the Evil Queen and what am I going to do?”  
“Well, I don’t imagine this will get so far, but maybe you and his birth mother could get into an agreement about his custody. And as far as Henry’s current situation with the fairy tale book, it does not matter in court, because you are not an abusive parent, and neither a neglective one. I can testify it as can a great group of people on this town. But this is all ‘what if’ situation and what do I tell you about ‘what if’s’?”  
“They’re only worth worry when they become real. But...”  
Dr. Hopper interrupts. “Regina, these are hypothetical scenarios. You are worrying about nothing.”  
“Fine. If you say so.”  
“Now, let’s talk about this.” He goes to his answering machine and presses the button. Regina’s voice filled the room. “Dr. Hopper, please, I need your help. I saw him today. I got this awful flashback and I can’t shake the feeling of him. I can’t go back to this.”  
Regina sat down at the sofa in front of Dr. Hopper, silent.  
“Well, what happened yesterday that triggered you and what exactly it is that you saw?” He waited for a few beats, but she didn’t said anything so he continued. “Regina, you know you should avoid triggers, and you have been doing pretty well on your own this past years. You didn’t have one single flashback for the past 6 years, and even then they were few and far in between. What happened?”  
“That damned woman! She was talking about how she was Henry’s mother and I was shaking with rage, because how dare she? And then I said something about how she does not have any legal right to him and she said...” she choked, her voice charged with tears “she said that she understood why he left me.”  
“Okay, I can see how this could trigger you and...” Regina interrupted him with a humourless laugh.  
“This didn’t trigger me or at least didn’t bring the flashback per se. I slapped her. Yelled at her to shut up and that she wouldn’t take my baby from me. I tried to turn and leave, but she grabbed my arm. When I tried to shake it, her grip tightened and hurt me. That was when the flashback came. I begged her not to hurt me, I begged him not to hurt me. I managed to come back short after and kick her out of the house.”  
“She hurt you? Well, that’s...” He looked at where Regina was gripping her arm, probably involuntarily. “Anyway, What she said about Leopold” he saw Regina flinch at the mention of his name. She was his paciente since coming to Storybrooke, even before she adopted Henry, and she still didn’t say his name. “triggered you and the act, gripping your arm roughly, brought the flashback. I’d recommend avoid being in this kind of situations. You’re already avoiding Miss Blanchard as much as you can, just keep the good work and maybe try to avoid situations where someone may mention him or act in a way that will trigger you while we work better on this. Seeing that at the moment our time is up, I’d like for you to consider go back to 2 sessions a week, during this stressful time.”  
Regina sighed, she was as tired as she used to be at the beginning of her sessions with Dr. Hopper, so many years ago. “I will consider it.” Maybe today was a good day to work from home.  
“I suggest you take it easy today, maybe take the day off. You seem tired. And I will call you after I check my appointments and fit you in sometime later this week, okay?” He tried to reason with her.  
“Yes, I believe this is a good idea.” He looked at her, surprised. She must be worse than he thought. She never took a day off work unless absolutely necessary, usually if Henry was sick.  
“Well, goodbye then, Regina.”  
“Goodbye, Dr. Hopper.”  
Regina got out of the office in time to see Miss Swan walking back to Granny’s BnB. She huffed and got inside her car. She needed a drink.


	4. A Black Heart Can't Love

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Henry's a little shit.  
> Completely Regina centered.

Emma Swan spent all her day thinking of what she was going to do. She wanted Henry. She was sure of that. She wanted that missing piece of her heart that was missing since she could remember and she thought that maybe if she had Henry, she’d finally have peace, she’d finally feel whole. But then, she had Regina Mills to deal with. The woman seemed to have control over the entire town. She needed to prove that Regina Mills was unfit to be a parent, which would probably be easy because Henry hated her and at least half of the town did too. She sent Mary Margareth a text to meet her at Granny’s for dinner to talk about sharing the loft and gather intel.  
Regina got home and got right into it. Many apple cider glasses in, she called Mal.  
“Mal, dear, I rrreally need your hellpp!” she slurred.  
Mal realised something was really wrong because her friend and boss did not get drunk since Henry came into her life.  
“Regina, what the hell are you doing? You’re getting drunk at the middle of the day? What the actual fuck?”  
Regina laughed at her but her voice sounded like she was trying not to cry.  
“Well, dear. My beautiful son decided that I’m an unfit parent and ran away, found his birth mother and brought her here, isn’t that just wonderful? And the bitch assaulted me, so now I’m back to square one in therapy with flashbacks of… Anyway… I need you.”  
“Regina, darling, I’m busy all the time. I can’t flee New York to help you and leave Mills Corp at bay. You hired me to be the face of this company so you could run it from the shadows, remember?”  
“Maleficent, please. You can ask Milli to do it for a few weeks. A month tops. Lily is homeschooled anyway, she can come too. When was the last time you had a vacation?”  
“By the same time you did. We don’t take vacations. The last time you took a vacation was when Henry got home, and I was on maternity leave then. And speaking of Lily, you know, she looks more like you everyday. She almost didn’t get anything from her father. Stephen mopes about it everytime I call.”  
“Right… I really need you, Mal. I can’t go through this on my own. Henry hates me because I’m not his ‘real mother’, as he puts. Mary Margareth makes my life harder everyday, using her position as his teacher to poison him against me. From time to time Gold comes wanting to make deals and I have to keep dodging him and now with His ghost haunting me again, I really need you. You’re my best friend. Please.”  
Mal took a deep breath. She knew she couldn’t deny Regina this. Not when she was begging. Regina didn’t beg nothing to anyone. Things have to be really bad for her to even ask.  
“It’s alright darling. I’ll need a couple of days to put things in order and ask my sister to step up on my meetings and other things like that.”  
“Millicent would never deny you this. You just have to say you’re coming here to help me. We gave her a career. She can give you a break to help me.”  
“Ok, ok. Yes, let’s manipulate my baby sister and spend a month in a hellhole at the end of the world in Maine. How fun this vacation!”  
“Just come.” Regina waited a beat and then whispered: “Please”.  
Mal sighed. She hated this woman. She loved this woman. She wanted to snap her neck. She’d do anything for her.  
“See you in a few days, ok? Rest for the afternoon, lots of liquids and get some work done at evening, I really need your signature for the upcoming project and I’m sure you have important things to do as Nowhere Hill, Maine’s mayor.”  
“Thank you, Mal. I appreciate it.”  
“Yes, yes, I’m well aware.”  
Mal hang up to start preparing her ‘vacation’ with Lilith. At least her 12 year old daughter would be happy. She loved Regina like a second mother. And it was not far from the truth, Mal thought. She remembered the 3 years trying to get pregnant, her husband growing disappointment, the doctor appointment, finding out she had a egg counting so low that the chance of she getting pregnant was none. She also remembered the doctor suggesting an egg bank and her friend, Regina, holding her hand and telling the doctor that even though she herself couldn’t bare a child, her egg counting was pretty high and she was willing to give Mal her eggs, if needed. Her daughter had Regina’s eyes and hair, her father’s chin and lips, Regina’s body structure and flawless skin. Every day she looked more like Regina.  
Mal recalled how it was when Lily found out she was an ivf child and biologically Regina’s. She was 8 and had gotten bullied at school because she looked nothing like her mom and the bigger kids told her she was a dumpster child.  
  
**Flashback**  
_Lily got home crying and when Mal asked what was going on, she asked:_  
_“Mommy, why don’t I look like you?”_  
_“That’s what got you sad, pumpkin?”_  
_“Luke and Dylan said you found me on a dumpster, because I don’t look like you at all. I said that that was silly because some people said I looked like daddy and then they said that maybe I was daddy’s daughter but I couldn’t be your daughter because I don’t look like you.”_  
_“That’s so not truth, honey. You are my daughter, my perfect little princess.”_  
_“But why don’t I look like you? People say I look like daddy, or like auntie Regina, when she takes me to movies and shopping, but they never say I look like you...”_  
_“See, honey, some women are born with equipment that makes babies inside their bellies. But not all women have it, some have just a part of that equipment, or part of it doesn’t work, or do not have it at all. All of that is ok but sometimes, you grow up and really wants to make a baby and ends up that you can’t do it and that makes you sad. Mommy was like that, she had part of her baby making equipment working, but not all of it and me and daddy really wanted a baby. Auntie Regina, had the equipment that I hadn’t and she loves mommy so much and wanted to be an auntie so badly that she gave me the part I was missing. So then, me and daddy made you.”_  
_“So that’s why I look like auntie Regina and not you?”_  
_“Yes. That’s it. But what matters is love. I love you so much and daddy loves you so much, that is what makes us family above anything else. Your friend Julie, for example, she is adopted and she does not look like neither of her daddies, now, does she?”_  
_“No, she doesn’t. But she said that is because she is not bi… bio… biolically their daughter.”_  
_“Biologically. It means that her daddies didn’t have the equipment to make a baby either. So they went and talked to people who take care of babies that don’t have families and told them that they wanted to have a family with a baby, that’s how they got her. But she’s no less their daughter because of it, because they love her and take care of her. That makes them family, forever.”_  
_“So I’m not biolically yours but auntie Regina’s?”_  
_“Biologically. Bi-o-lo-gi-cal-ly. But, yes. You are biologically half auntie Regina, half daddy. But that does not mean you are not mine, either because I love you with my whole heart. Which is two halfs. So you are twice as much mine.”_  
_“I love you too, mommy. But I love auntie Regina and daddy too, that’s ok, right?”_  
_“Of course, sweetheart. Just remember that love is what it counts.”_  
_“Yes. And we’re all family because we love each other. And we love auntie Milli, and uncle Peter and the 2 grandmas and grandpas and auntie Milli’s cat, George.”_  
_“Yes, yes, we love them all! Now give me a hug, munchkin and go play, I have to start dinner.”_  
_“‘s Ok, mom. Love you.”_  
_“Love you, Lily.”_  
**End Flashback**  
  
Lily took it all very well and even though she called Regina her biolical momma for almost a year after that it became an internal joke beetwen them and their relationship didn’t change at all and hers and Mal’s didn’t change either. They are niece and aunt, mother and daughter, respectively, no matter what. How could Henry not understand that? She needed to talk to him before he completely broke his mother’s heart. Only Mal knew everything that happened to Regina and emotionally frail she really was. It had been her idea for Regina to start therapy, so maybe she could repair some of her pasts damage. She was going so well and now she regressed because of this woman that her own son brought to her life. Mal didn’t even knew her name, but nobody had the right to hurt her best friend. She hated this woman already!  
Regina slept all afternoon. She didn’t see Henry get home, neither saw as he left to go after Emma and Roland. When she woke up and saw the house empty, she sighed, drank two advil’s for the headache she saw coming and called Henry’s cell.  
Henry picked up his cellphone with a huff.  
“What do you want, Regina?”  
“Excuse me?” Regina closed her eyes and tried to suppress her anger. Henry was crossing all limits trying to push her away. He was being petty and downright rude and breaking her heart.  
“I’m busy, Regina, I’m spending time with my mom and Rolo.”  
“Henry, I know I said you could spend time with your brother, but not without asking me. I want you home in five minutes.”  
“I don’t have to listen to you. You are not my mother.”  
“Henry Daniel Mills, until the day you no longer carry the names of the most important men in my life and my family name, you are my son and will follow my orders, otherwise I’m sending you to a boarding school so far away that your birth mother will never be able to find you. I did nothing to deserve your disrespect and disdain. I’m sorry she didn’t keep you, but I did. I took care of you and loved you and always will, so please, just… stop fighting me and come home.”  
“Fine.”  
Regina pressed her hands on her face and screamed. Then she got up and started dinner. Henry got home, stomped right to his room and stayed there. When she called him to dinner, he came and ate in silence. When Regina asked him how school went, he glared at her and said.  
“You can’t keep me from my family, anymore, Evil Queen. Emma is the saviour and she’ll break the curse and I’ll be a prince and you will go to jail and be alone forever.”  
Regina tried to keep herself together but the tears started rolling down her eyes. “Sweet Jesus, Henry. What have I done to you that you hate me so much? What did I do? Just tell me and I’ll fix it, I swear.”  
Henry just scowled at her “You don’t fool me. The book says a black heart can’t love. And your heart is black and evil. That’s why you tried to kill Snow White, you are Miss Blanchard evil stepmother! And you are full of hatred and envy because she’s prettier than you so you cursed the town so no one can be happy, just you. But Emma is going to fix it! And then she’ll be with her parents and me and Roland!”  
Regina, still crying, begged “Henry, please. I can’t fix this fairy tale you locked yourself into. I need you to come to the real world with me and see, my baby, magic and curses don’t exist. Please, Henry just try to listen to mommy. I love you so much, my prince, sometimes it hurts because my heart is so full of love for you! I need you to believe it, Henry. I need you to believe me!”  
Henry stopped for a moment, as if trying to understand her. But then his eyes hardened again and he said.  
“No. You’re lying. And I’m a hero and you are the villain, you are trying to set me up in a trap. And I hate you!” He ran to his room.  
Regina stayed at the table crying. She never before saw so much hate in her son’s eyes. She played his speech time and again in her mind until sometime popped up and she gasped. Henry had said ‘you are Miss Blanchard evil stepmother’. No, no, no… that cannot happen. Nobody must know she married Him. How could Henry know? That dreadful woman must have told him something and she was going to find out exactly what she said. She cleaned the table with determination, took a shower, got ready. Then she went to Henry’s room, knocked at the door and said:  
“Sweety, mommy has something to take care of really fast. You have your phone, don’t let nobody in, I’ll be back as soon as possible.”  
She got her keys and left to Mary Margareth Blanchard’s loft. This was other woman who she dreamed of being free of. Actually, this was the number one woman in her two women ‘to be free of’ list. She never understood what Mary Margareth was doing here in Storybrooke beyond haunting her. She remembered the last discussion they had. Yes, haunting alright. The woman was hellbent to make her life hell and for the first time in 15 years, she was doing it right by polluting her son’s mind against her.  
She got to the apartment and knocked with more force than necessary. She waited one second and knocked with even more force. When the door opened, she gasped and gave two steps back. Emma Swan looked at her, smirked and said.  
“Well, hello there, Madam Mayor.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really don't know if I can fix their relationship, by this point. And I noticed that it has what.. 2, 3 days since Emma came to town and Regina's life is a complete hell. kk'  
> I hope I can post the next 2 chapters until sunday. But I have to fix some things first.


	5. Preparing for Battle

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so sorry. I'll stop saying when I will post things, because I can almost never follow through. I'm going nuts with books to read, papers to write, equations and numbers...  
> Anyway... Right now, the only thing I can promise is that I won't cancel the story. I will finish. How soon? I don't know.  
> Hope you like this one.

“Miss Swan, what a surprise. I see you and Miss Blanchard are already getting along. How surprising.”  
“Well, we do seem to have something in comum. But come on in, she said she’ll be right back.”  
Regina got in and forced herself not to run away as her mind was screaming at her to. She moved herself to the living room and stayed put. The least she entered in Mary Margareth Blanchard’s territory, the best.  
Mary Margareth came back.  
“David, I was telling Emma...”  
She froze in the instant she saw Regina. Her face soon turned from disbelief to anger.  
“What are you doing here?”  
“I’m here because you are stepping too far! You have everything you need, I don’t know why you live at this place, or why you are in Storybrooke at all. You need to live your life and stop messing with mine. I moved far away from everything to be in peace, not for you to haunt me! Stop being a child and creating confusion for my son, pretending to be telling him things by accident and destroying my relationship with him with your lies! I’m tired of you and I’m warning you. You’ll regret messing with Henry!”  
“You came here to threaten me? I already know what you are capable of, Stepmother! And I’ll find a way to prove it and then there will be no Storybrooke, no Henry, no anything for you. Just a lifetime in jail.”  
Regina’s patience was really running thin. For the last 19 years, Mary Margareth had been a torn at her side. She played safe, kept her cool, been the big person. But nobody threatened to take her child.  
“I’m sorry, dear, but your delusions are really going too far. I did nothing wrong, in both accounts. You just got the bad end of a business deal, I just used the opportunity. And plotting to take Henry from me? That’s gold! You both will regret this even more than trying to stop me the first time.”  
Mary Margareth looked at her with murder in her eyes and Emma seemed lost for a moment. How much history that was between this two women? What was she stepping into?  
“You don’t scare me, Regina. I’m not some frightened little girl who just lost everything anymore. I’m gonna take you down.”  
Regina huffed.  
“Good Lord, I’ll enjoy to see you trying. Whatever it is you think you have, it’s not real. Whatever it is you imagine is true, is not. But you better believe, sweet child, if you try to use Miss Swan and Henry to push me, if you choose to do so, I’ll make sure you find out the truth in the most public and painful way, if is the last thing I do.”  
She turned and walked to the door, when she turned the doorhandle, Mary Margareth said, making her stop.  
“Do you think you will scare Emma away with this? She’ll take Henry from you and I’ll take everything else.”  
Regina looked at her and her face suddenly turned from angry to a cold look and detached madwoman smirk in her lips.  
“We shall see.”  
Regina got home and got to the phone. Work would distract her from this nightmare her life had turned into.  
The following morning, Regina woke up early and called Sidney, her PI.  
“Good morning, Mr. Glass.”  
“Madam Mayor, always a pleasure.” The man seemed to purr on the phone. Regina held in a remark and her disgust.  
“Sidney, I need a really big favor.”  
“Anything you want, my queen.”  
“It is something that will require your entire team, probably. It is a list of things, actually. All of them are equally important and I can’t stress this enough: this should be dealt with the utmost attention and secrecy.”  
“Of course. What is it?”  
“First: Mary Margareth Blanchard is creating some kind of dossier from our combined past, I need you to find out what she has. Listen carefully: do not interfere. Just find out and report. I know for a fact that she will get nowhere with this, but it may cost me Henry, if I’m not careful.  
Second: I need a full report in Emma and Roland Swan. Both of them from birth. Every breath, every step you can find.  
Third and probably the hardest: I need you to track Henry’s past. From Miss Swan pregnancy to the first five month of his life.”  
“Anything else, Madam Mayor?”  
“No, Mr. Glass. I need this well and fast done. Do you understand?”  
“Have I ever disappointed you, Madam Mayor?”  
Regina decided to throw him a bone to keep him happy and complying, giving him a sense of intimacy.  
“No, Sidney, you have not. Keep up the good work.”  
“I will report as soon as my team find something, Madam Mayor. Only the best for you, my queen.”  
“Have a good day, Mr. Glass.”  
Regina sighed. Next call, her lawyer.  
“Kathryn, dear, I am in need of your assistance.”  
“I was imagining when you’d call.”  
“What do you mean?”  
“My oh, so dear husband, the ‘good’ lawyer, the fighter of the good, is sleeping with Mary Margareth Blanchard. I hired a PI to follow him and figured out your not so little situation, so I was waiting anxiously for your call, because this is the greatest conflict interest I’ve ever seen and my soon-to-be-ex husband is going to eat dirt, I assure you.”  
“Well, it seems I’m not the only one who has some problems with Miss Blanchard. But are you aware of what is happening, then?”  
“It seems to me that a decade is not enough time for her to get over the lost of White Corp and her fancy life to me. But I doubt she has anything real against you.”  
“I didn’t take her fancy life from her. I left her with more than enough money to live her whole life comfortably. I am not a monster. Vengeful, yes. Heartless, no.”  
“Well, it seems to me she disagrees.”  
“Focusing on more important matters, don’t you have to divorce Mr. Nolan before taking this case? Otherwise, it is conflict of interest anyway, or am I wrong?”  
“You’re absolutely right. I’ll serve him the papers in three days. I’m going to take everything from him. I have all evidence of his infidelity and our pre-nup is flawless. Perks of marriage between lawyers, I guess.”  
“I am sorry for your marriage, dear. Prepare yourself for this case and make him regret his choice.”  
“Oh, I will. I’ll call you later to arrange a meeting.”  
“Call the office. My assistance will put you through.”  
“It seems I became a part of a very closed circle of people. ‘The ones Regina Mills takes the call’ group.”  
“Well, don’t abuse it. I’ll wait your call, Kathryn.”  
“Bye, Regina.”  
Regina smiled a little at the thought of David Nolan having to confront his ex-wife on court. Kathryn was a far superior lawyer than him. At least this part would be a little funny.  
She got ready to go to work and made a point of occupy herself in order to not fret over this whole mess her life turned on the last four days.  
By the time afternoon came, Regina’s work was piling on her desk and she couldn’t concentrate. She called Ms. French, the town librarian and Regina’s usual to go choice in temporary mayor when she needed time off work. She remembered her talk with Mal, they usually never had vacation, so she had more than enough time on the house. She needed to take the time to try and rebuild her relationship with Henry. She called a meeting at the Town Hall to six in the evening to explain to the citizens why she was taking a leave of absence from office. She wrote her speech and prepared herself to go home for at least one month.  
She organized the office, so what Belle was going to need was available and her things didn’t get in the way for the other woman do her work. She thought about how happy she was during all this time in her office, even though it was a lot of work, because she knew she was helping the city to thrive. When Belle got there, she explained where everything was and made a point of explaining all about what needed to be done, what she had started, what needed to be started on the next month, passed her contact numbers and made sure she’d be able to keep the town going. By the time of the meeting, everything was ready.  
Regina entered the town hall and noticed everyone was already waiting for her. She decided to start.  
“Good evening, everyone. I’m sorry for calling this impromptu meeting, but I promise I’ll be fast. I am the elected mayor of this town for six years, now and I love it. So much as not taking a single vacation since Henry’s maternity leave, as you all know. And I feel honored that you all trust me as your mayor for what is now my second term, even though I know a very big group of you don’t feel much for me personally.  
But as this is a small town, as I know a lot about my citizens, you all also know that a lot of things happened in a curt period of time in my small family life and my son is and ever will be my priority. So, in order to fix what can be fixed and work through what can’t, I called Ms. French and asked her to assume the position of temporary mayor while for 30 days. A month, like a vacation, for me to organize my personal life and come back focused in my work for the town once again. Any questions?”  
Mary Margareth got up.  
“I never thought you were going to run away, Regina.”  
“I assure you, Miss Blanchard, I have no intention of going anywhere. I will be in town during the whole month. One of my personal friends is actually coming here to visit and help during this time.”  
Mary Margareth huffed and sat down.  
“Anyone else?”  
Eugenia Lucas, or Granny, got up and asked.  
“So if you are not leaving town, if something comes up you will be able to step up and fix it, right?”  
“Of course, Widow Lucas, I’m one call away. You all know where I live, you can just go there if the situation demands my attention. But I am completely certain of Ms French’s capabilities, she will take good care of our town during my time off. If this is everything, I’m concluding this meeting with the invite for you all to eat some of the goods and snacks on the side table.”  
Regina stayed until the last person left. Then she organized and closed everything and went home. The next day would be the start of preparation for at least one big fight and she needed the rest.


	6. A Crime Without Forgiveness

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How did Henry end up in that orphnage in Boston?  
> Regina starts to figure out how she came to have her son, but something will get in the way of her pursuit of an answer right now.

Saturday morning came faster than Regina would have liked.  
She got up at 6am and started preparing breakfast. At 7, she woke Henry to explain to him her leave of absence from work and try to create a schedule with him during this month. He had school, since it was october, but they could plan things for afternoons and evenings.  
They were in middle of breakfast when she decided to address her plans to her son.  
“Henry, yesterday I took a leave of absence from work, so I will be home for the next month.”  
He looked at her suspiciously.  
“Why?”  
“I think you and I need to spend some time together, maybe talk a little more… Aunt Mal and Lily are coming to spend some time here as well. We could have a little family time.”  
“I don’t want to talk to you. I don’t want to spend time with you. I want my mom and my brother. You don’t want to spend time with me, you want to stop me from spending time with them because we can break your curse.”  
“Henry, please. I don’t know how many times I have to say that this curse is not real and that I love you, baby. You are the best thing that ever happened to me and every time you say this things you hurt me so much.” Regina looked tired, even if the day had barely started. She was fighting this war with Henry since he found out he was adopted a couple of month before and it was really tiresome.  
“You are the Evil Queen. You are a liar and you don’t love anyone! If you were not Evil you would let me go to my family!”  
“I am your family! I, the woman who bathed you, clothed you, sooted your fears and fevers, fed you, told you stories, bought you presents for Christmas, made you birthdays cakes. It does not matter that I didn’t give birth to you because I took care of you and loved you during all this time when your birth mother did not even knew you were alive. She was happily living in Boston with Roland without having a clue about you and I am sorry that I am not what you want and that you didn’t get a chance to know what it was like to be raised by Emma Swan and be Ray Swan, like you seem to want to be, but even though you are not Ray Swan, you are Henry Daniel Mills, and even though I am not what you wanted, you are what I wanted, all I ever wanted. My perfect little family, my son, my baby.”  
“I am not your baby.”  
Regina started crying, she was so tired of being dismissed as a mother. Emma Swan, Mary Margareth Blanchard, David Nolan, all of them seemed to believe themselves in the right of telling her that she had no rights to her son. But none of them had the power to hurt her. Not like this 10 year old boy in front of her had and every time Henry said she wasn’t his mother, a piece of her heart fell apart. She couldn’t lose Henry, he was her sun, moon and stars.  
She made a decision, then.  
“Henry,I love you so much, I just want to talk to you and see if we can fix things between us. Before you knew you were adopted, we were ok. I don’t think knowing I’m not your birth mother should have had such an impact to make you hate me that much! Let me make a deal with you, ok? I will grant your birth mother two supervised visits per week. I can make dinner or we all can go to the movies. But that’s it. No more running away, no more yelling at me because you are angry, no more fairy tails. If you agree, I want you on your best behaviour, ok? We will talk and you’ll say what made you so angry and I promise I’ll do my best to fix it, as I ever tried to do. I’d do anything for you!”  
Henry looked at her surprised and happiness shone out in his eyes for a second before his expression turned to distrustful.  
“You will let me spend time with Emma? Why? She is the saviour! She will destroy your curse.”  
“Maybe spending time with her, will make you see that this curse is not real and she’s no saviour. Unless you believe your life with me is so awful that she came here to try and save you from me, that is.”  
Henry still seemed to be trying to figure out what to answer. Maybe Emma could figure out how to break the curse on her own. Maybe he could make her believe the curse was real and then he wouldn’t need to keep talking about it. He just had to prove to Emma that magic was real and that she was the savior.  
“May I go see Emma today?”  
Regina stiffened in her seat. She didn’t want to let him, but maybe this was the way to make him see she was serious.  
“At the afternoon, today, I’ll come with you to Granny’s so you can spend some time with Roland and Miss Swan, how does that sound to you?”  
“But will you stay?”  
Regina couldn’t stop the hurt in her eyes and the pain in her heart, but she swallowed it down.  
“As you have been running away from home more often than not, I cannot trust you to go by yourself, but if you prefer, I can leave as soon as I am sure that you are safe with Miss Swan and Roland. I know you have their contact, so please make sure they are there by 2pm today, if they are willing to spend the afternoon with you.”  
“Yeah, that’s good.” He seemed to think a little bit and then said “Thanks.”  
She sighed. Baby steps, she reminded herself.  
“You’re welcome, Henry.”  
After that, things seemed to work out more smoothly. Henry was still skittish, but a little more willing, so they planned for movies and videogames afternoon the next day and then Henry left to his room saying he needed to prepare to talk to Emma later. Regina worried this was another operation he was preparing but at the moment, she couldn’t do much about it.  
Right before lunch she received a text from Mal telling her she’d be coming by on tuesday and was hoping to be treated like a movie star, since she was leaving the civilized world to come to this god forsaken land in the middle of nowhere. At least Mal and Lily wouldn’t think it was such an imposition to spend time with her.  
Henry came down for lunch at noon, as was routine. Sat down to eat his meal and decided to forsake his medicine.  
“Did you take your meds, Henry?”  
“Roland doesn’t take meds. I won’t take them anymore. Maybe they’re not even real meds, you probably invented them to control my mind or something with your magic.”  
“Henry, don’t you think we had too much discussions today already? Just take your meds.”  
“I don’t want to take them. I won’t take them.”  
“Well, you may as well call Miss Swan and let her know you cannot see her later today.”  
“You can’t do that!”  
“I can and I will. Hate me, for all I care. I am tired of your childish pettiness. Later we can go back to this, if you want to, but right now you are going to do as I say, because I’m the adult, I know best and you need to take your meds!”  
“Fine. I hate you!”  
Regina ran her hand through her hair and tried to remember the good moments she had with her son. It seemed all the good things were so distant and all she could remember was the fights, the screaming matches, the stomping through the house. She shook her head and watched Henry take his meds and eat.  
After lunch Regina mentally prepared herself to go to Granny’s and face the woman who threatened her place in her son’s life. She cleaned the kitchen, took a shower, tried to read something but she was to anxious, tried to answer some emails Mal sent her, but couldn’t stay still. By the time she and Henry had to leave, she was almost crawling out of her skin.  
They got to Granny’s 10 minutes early, but the Swans were already there, waiting. As soon as he spot them inside the diner, Henry ran to them yelling.  
“Mom! Rolo!”  
Regina had to hold a scream herself. Everytime Henry called that stranger ‘mom’, she felt like punching something, preferably Emma Swan’s face. But the saying is you catch more bees with honey… or something, so she approached them with a neutral face.  
“Good afternoon, Miss Swan. Roland. I promised Henry I wouldn’t interfere in your afternoon, so I must be going. I trust you to deliver my son back at the house before dark, Miss Swan.”  
“Of course.” Emma smirked at her and said in an almost whisper. “Wouldn’t want the kid to have too much fun in case he decided to not come back at all, now can we?”  
“Excuse me?” Regina fumed. How dare she?  
“Nothing, nothing. We’ll bring him back just in time.”  
“See to it that you do.”  
Regina turned and left. She needed Sidney to deliver something she could use to keep that woman away from Henry soon.  
As if summoned from her thoughts, when she got home, Sidney Glass had left her a voicemail.  
“Madam Mayor, I have the files on Emma and Roland Swan as well as a copy of Miss Blanchard’s dossier on you and a dossier of her movements since she was 14 years old. Call me so I can deliver them to your house as soon as you’re able. We need to discuss the last item of your list also.”  
She calls him back. Half an hour later and she was on her study going through the material Sidney’s team found about Henry.  
“All of this I already knew. I want to know why they lied about his death, how he end up at the orphanage in Boston.”  
“Yes, I understand, my queen and that’s why we need to talk. If you look at the end of the file, you’ll see that even though we didn’t found what you were looking for, we found something else.”  
“What is this?”  
“This are the records in stillbirths and deaths of newborns in the Phoenix General Hospital. For fifteen years, they had the biggest numbers of the country for a great margin, but seven years ago, the number went down and now is almost zero. During this fifteen years, to each 5 twin births, at least in one, the first twin died and the parents never saw the body. To each 20 births of a single child, at least 3 died from a mysterious cause and the parents were convinced to let the child’s body to science, but none of this bodies went actually to a class or lab. My crew found some pointers that seem to indicate the hospital was in deep with human traffic. Selling this babies. And probably Henry was one of the kids caught.”  
“Oh god… This is… Oh, god! Fifteen years! How many children?”  
“For what my team saw, the average was 35 to 40 per month. For what we saw, it was probably between 6 and 10 thousand children in fifteen years. They targeted single mothers from 16-25 years old and underprivileged couples from 18-35 years old.”  
“How no one saw this? Oh my god! This is… oh, my baby...” Regina didn’t even realized she was crying until a sob broke from her throat. How many parents had mourned their children which had been stolen from them, like Emma Swan had. She couldn’t even fathom something like this. They had come across something way bigger than what she had first assumed. She thought this was an isolated case. Something that was probably going to become a lawsuit to the hospital, money enough to Emma Swan to live comfortably for the rest of her life and in the worst case scenario, she having two permit her to spend one weekend day with Henry every other week and share some vacation time until he was 18. She was coming to terms with that. Now this was a complete different scenario. This was a huge mafia in play, it could put Sidney and his crew, she herself, Emma Swan and even worst Henry and Roland in mortal danger.  
Regina took a breath, stilled herself and turned back to the subject.  
“Are your crew still looking into this?”  
“Yes, I left them following some clues from the hospital.”  
“Call them back. I’ll pay you for what you found already as if you had completed the job. For what is worth, you gave me what I needed. You send me whatever else they found until this point and call the job off. As soon as you send me everything you found on this I’ll pay the whole price.”  
“But Regina...”  
“No, Mr. Glass, I won’t have your team risking their lives. If this is really what you think it is, then Miss Swan and I need to have a talk and work our next step. This is a police case. It can and probably will get messy. I won’t put anyone’s lives at risk without thinking this through. Maybe we can send this as an anonymous tip for the Arizona police, I don’t know. Now, please leave. I’ll call you soon.”  
“Regina, wait. We can’t prove anything but my team believes that the man behind this, was the pediatrician Dr. Victor Whale. I looked into his background myself. He is dead. He died and it stopped.”  
“Well, how did he died?”  
“He was killed. It was registered as a robbery gone wrong, but knowing what we know, it probably was an execution. A gunshot in the head.”  
“Not good enough.” She said with hatred flashing in her eyes. “But we can’t change that now, can we?”  
“But is over, you don’t need to put yourself or the small one in danger because of this. It stopped.”  
“Stopped in this hospital, but what about others? How many more children around the country are being stolen from their parents? You don’t know if this Dr. Whale was the mastermind behind it, or just a tool. Maybe they are just more subtle now.”  
“Is it worth it to put your life on the line for this, though, My Queen?”  
Regina sighed. This infatuation Sidney harbored for her could be an asset but it was also a burden.  
“Sidney, you aren’t a parent, so you don’t understand this kind of pain. Is something no one should know, the pain of losing their child. Take a child from their parents is a crime without forgiveness. Now, this have to be taken care of with the utmost secrecy. If there is someone at your agency you don’t trust, buy their silence. This could put all of us in danger and I really rather be alive to see Henry become an adult, do you understand me?”  
“And you are going to trust the Emma Swan one with this info?”  
“She has a right to know.”  
“Maybe read her file first. Otherwise you might as well end up killing all of us anyway. I’m leaving.”  
Sidney left the study and the house, stomping like a petulant child leaving Regina behind with the eyes wide, her heart speeding up. If Emma Swan was more dangerous than it seemed, Henry might be in danger. She left him with her. She shot to her desk and caught Emma Swan’s file.  
She called Henry right away. This woman was never seeing her son again. Voicemail. She tried again. Voicemail. She tried again.  
“Henry!”  
“Ms Regina?”  
“Roland? Why are you crying? Where is Henry? Where is Miss Swan?”  
“Henry had a fight with Ma and ran away. I ran after him and he convinced me to do something really stupid and now he is stuck.”  
“Stuck where? Roland, what is happening?”  
“He is stuck in the mines.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm writing this as fast as I can this week because my teachers are cutting me a slack. I started the other chapter so maybe I wont take so long to update.


	7. The Mines

“He said there was fairy dust in the mines and that he was going to prove to us that magic was real. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. I’m sorry...” Roland started sobbing on the phone, Regina shot up to the door.  
“Roland… Roland… is not your fault, is ok! I’m not angry at you. Call your mother, I’m going to get to you right away, ok? I’m on my car now, ok? Call your mother for me, baby boy, I’m going to call the sheriff and we will take Henry out and you’ll get lots of ice cream for being so brave, ok?”  
“Ok… ok… ”  
“Can you call your mom now ok, Roland? Can you do that now for me? Tell her where you are, ok? I’ll call you back as soon as you are over.”  
“Ok… ok, I’ll call her.”  
“I’m getting there now, Roland, hang in there. Just a minute longer.” She waited for him to disconnect and said.  
“Call Graham.”  
The phone rang twice before he picked up.  
“Graham, I really need you right now. Henry is with Roland at the mines, it seems he is stuck inside and Roland is outside, despairing. I need you.”  
“I’m on my way, Regina. Everything is going to be alright.”  
“Thanks, I promised to call Roland back, I’m almost there. Ah, Graham, the plants and maps.”  
“Ok. I have them here. I’ll get there in a bit.” he disconnected.  
“Call Henry. Roland?”  
“She hates me, she hates me, she’ll never forgive me!”  
“Roland, calm down, sweetheart. What is going on? Did you call your mother? Is she coming?”  
“She hates me. She yelled at me, she never yelled at me before. She thinks it is my fault that he is going to die.” Roland wailed on the phone. Regina had to hold in her own panic to help the child.  
“Listen to me, Roland. No one hates you and Henry is not going to die. I’m seeing you right now, can you see me? I just stopped the car. Come here sweetheart.”  
Regina left the car and Roland ran to her and glued himself to her waist and kept sobbing.  
“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, it’s all my fault.”  
“It’s not your fault, Roland. Look at me. Henry has been putting himself in trouble for a time now, is not your fault and your mother does not hate you. Let me tell you something ok? A mother never hates her children. Look at me, I’m sad and disappointed at Henry but I could never hate him. He is my baby and I love him. Ok? Your mom is just worried, she loves you. Now you’re going to take a deep breath, in and out, and I’m going to see what I can do and we’ll take Henry out of this hole and he will be grounded for life, ok?”  
“Ok.” He sniffed.  
“Good boy. Now go wait next to the car. The sheriff is coming right now and everything is going to be ok.” Regina turned to the mines and started pacing. She went to the opening of the mine and saw the group of rocks blocking the exit. How could Henry be so stupid? He could be in mortal danger now. If anymore tunnels collapse… she couldn’t even think about it. All because of this obsession with magic. She’d burn the damn book along with Mary Margareth Blanchard.  
“Regina!”  
She turned and saw Graham running to her and Miss Swan’s car parking behind the police cruiser. Graham had the maps and plants of the old mines in one hand and she tucked herself in his arms and he hugged her protectively.  
“It’s going to be fine, Regina. We’ll get him out and then”  
“Excuse me, but shouldn’t you be getting my son out of the mines instead of playing couples with the mayor, sheriff?”  
Regina put herself together and looked at Miss Swan.  
“Your son is just fine, Miss Swan. He is right there next to my car and you didn’t even acknowledged him.” She turned to Graham then. “Sheriff, please, how are we going to help Henry.”  
Emma glared at Regina. How dare she play this “Henry is not your son game” right now? She didn’t even seemed concerned with the kid!  
Regina was almost combusting right on the spot. She was shaking, almost vibrating in anger, concern and fear. If something happened to Henry, she didn’t even could think. God, she would lose her mind.  
Graham was talking but she could barely listen.  
“Regina! Are you listening?”  
“Yes. I’m sorry, you know how I can get… ”  
“Kinda crazy when Henry is concerned? I know, believe me. But right now, I need you to focus. We’ll have to lower someone there to bring him back.”  
“That’s easy enough. Lower me. He’s my son.”  
Emma had walked towards them and listened the plan and decided to interrupt.  
“With all due respect, ‘your Majesty’ but you work seated behind a desk. Let me do it. I’ll bring him back.”  
Regina didn’t like this. Emma Swan playing saviour of the day would only reinforce Henry’s idea of fairy tales.  
“That’s not” She breathed in. She’d not put Henry at risk because she was jealous of his birth mother. “Just bring him to me.” She turned to Graham “make sure to do it right, Sheriff.” She’d not show Miss Swan anymore weaknesses. She had some pride to maintain after all.  
She went to Roland, instead. The boy had calmed some and was silently crying, seated next to Regina’s Mercedes. She crouched next to him.  
“Hello, Roland.”  
“Hi.”  
“Are you feeling better?”  
“She didn’t even looked at me! She will hate me forever.”  
“You are just a boy, handsome. Your mother is just worried. She’ll go down the mine to bring Henry back to us, now. Is going to be all right. You don’t have to worry. He’s fine. I’d know if he’s not. Mothers have a sixth sense to know if their babies are fine.”  
“Promise?”  
“I do.”  
She couldn’t know how much time passed but when Miss Swan and Henry got out of the mines she shot right to Henry’s side.  
“Henry, Henry… Oh, thanks the gods! My baby, Henry!” her concern turning to anger “what were you thinking? You could have died! Do you have any idea how worried I was… and Roland was beside himself!” she turned to Roland, who were looking at them with haunted eyes. “Come here, Roland.”  
He went, with his hands on the pockets of his pants. He never looked so much like his mother, Regina noticed.  
“See? I told him he was okay.”  
Roland restarted his crying. “I’m so sorry, Ms Regina. I should not have listened, I just thought he’d see that there was nothing there and come back. I’m sorry.” Regina just shook her head. “It’s okay, Roland.”  
“Miss Swan, you should take care of Roland now. Henry and I will be going home. He is grounded for the next 5 reincarnations, minimum.”  
“Mom, I’m sorry! I promise I’ll not do it again. It was an accident!” Henry whined.  
“One that could have get you killed!” She turned back to Miss Swan “You and I will need to talk, but it’ll be probably done in the sheriff’s office.”  
Henry followed Regina in silence to the car, got in and they went home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Long time no see.. Lots of bad things happened in my 2017/2018... I hope it gets better now.  
> Comment what u guys thought of the chapter.. is not much and it was something I kinda found lost here...   
> I'm not giving up on this story, I just been having a really shitty time on my personal life. see ya.


End file.
